Happy Tail: Yorkie mix fills Beans’s paws

byJoan, staff writer

Sometimes we think we’re looking for one thing, but find ultimate satisfaction in another. Kate George, an author who lives in South Royalton, VT, wanted a fluffy dog like the one she had as a child. “I’ve been living with short-haired dogs for ten years,” she says. Even in her first book, it was a short-haired Chihuahua named Beans who played a role.

Kate could not get the little pooch off her mind, so she filled out the application and waited. “[My protagonist] had Beans; surely his twin should be mine,” she says.

One obstacle was that the dog was in Tennessee and would need to be put on a transport to the Northeast. Kate worried about adopting a dog she hadn’t even met. But the shelter has safeguards in place. First, Kate had to furnish references, and many emails and phone calls traveled back and forth. She also had to sign a contract saying she would return the dog if the adoption didn’t work out. Fortunately, PAWS of Dale Hollow has partnered with a rescue in New Hampshire so, should it not be a good match, Kate wouldn’t have to drive clear to Tennessee.

The adoption was approved, and one day the little pooch arrived on a transport van. Pippin, as she is named is bigger than her fictional Beans, “but not much,” Kate says. “Mostly her legs are longer.”

Kate has other dogs. Pippin can walk right under Moose, a Golden Retriever mix, and the little dog lords it over him a bit. She “will chase him around the yard and then, in turn, be chased,” Kate says. Each morning, upon arising, the two have to touch noses before they start the day.

Kate’s older dog, a Beagle mix, has been depressed since their “black Lab had to be put to sleep last year … Pippin seems to know that Zoe is unhappy and has started to bring Zoe out of her slump. She licks Zoe’s nose and gets Zoe playing with her.”

Pippin has her quiet times. “When I sit down to work on the computer or watch TV, she either curls up in my lap or crawls up to lie across my shoulders like a cat!”

She’s not a mop on four legs, but her devotion to her new family more than makes up for a slight change in plans.